Lord of War [Blu-ray]

'Lord of War' is a film which follows the life and career of Yuri Orlov (played by Nicholas Cage, who was also a producer), a Russian man who moved with his family when a young boy to the USA; for almost all his adult life he has been a professional international small-arms dealer. On Blu-ray it looks excellent and, despite the audio soundtrack 'only' being Dolby Digital 5.1, sounds very good.

As there are spotlights on tragedy, strife and morality it is perhaps tempting to pigeon-hole the genre of the film more precisely, but I would label it as a drama with some elements of being a thriller (so don't expect anything like 'Die-Hard' !). However, I am quite certain that it is not, as the Amazon synopsis refers to it, a 'black-comedy' in the general sense of how I judge such films; I don't think there are any laughs to be had nor opportunities to refer to various occurrences as bleakly ironic. There are obviously some very serious aspects to what it depicts, namely: the often nasty personalities involved and eventual victims of the 'products' being bought/sold, but the overall aim is to 'lighten' the associated moral messages with stylistic, often novel, production-values and a snappy musical soundtrack. Be in no doubt though, that whilst the presentation is designed to entertain the overall aim is to inject those moral messages into your thought process....

The opening of the movie reinforces that concept, by way of an artistic collation of scenes depicting the 'journey' of a bullet from manufacture to being fired into the head of a young African boy who himself is firing a gun; aside from being unusual in presentation, the message derived from what we see is clear - things are usually dealt with more subtly from then on. We are then introduced to Yuri, by himself, and see the rest of the film (which covers a period of several decades, starting in the 1980s) from his viewpoint with him providing regular voiceover 'annotations'. As we not only see his globetrotting activities, but also 'hear' his thoughts (which obviously often raise contradictions !), some attempt can be made to understand the dilemmas he often finds himself in whilst remembering all along that he is arms-trading voluntarily and for profit, so ultimately we should feel little sympathy for him. We also see how his profession affects his personal life and essentially that his apparently pleasant persona is really a veneer covering someone who is really quite cold and without scruples. Finally, interspersed amongst his primary dealings, the attempts of officialdom to bring him to justice are covered....

The production-values (signposted by that previously mentioned opening sequence) of this film are excellent, with many stylish scenes involving dramatic action, explosions, backdrops and tailored musical accompaniment. The action involves those explosions, some flying sequences, a dramatic aircraft landing and (of course) quite a bit of weaponry being fired. It is notable to observe that little, perhaps no, CGI is used for the special-effects although a bit of digital jiggery-pokery clearly is employed when the cast and ironmongery or explosions get into close proximity ! In the same vein, almost all the weaponry is genuine - right down to us seeing several thousand rifles stored in a warehouse or a long row of smartly presented Russian T-72 main-battle tanks !

Without giving anything important away, a good example of the type of production you can expect would be a short slow-motion scene where Yuri watches a 'customer' firing a Kalashnikov rifle, which is accompanied by the song 'Money (That's What I Want)' by the The Flying Lizards with each cartridge ejection embellished with the sound-effect of a cash-till 'ringing'. Similarly, and for once, it is safe to watch the 2min theatrical trailer (Internet video sites have it) to get an idea of the way the film is made and will pan out, without spoiling a later viewing of the complete movie....

Contrary to some other reviewers I found the HD image to be sharp, bright and clear without any obvious or intrusive grain or 'snow' to spoilt things; the reproduction of black-levels and scenes in dark surroundings (of which there are quite a few) is especially good. Similarly, the soundtrack has great clarity and is very lively, despite 'only' being Dolby Digital 5.1; this movie on Blu-ray shows that, like the similarly specified disc of 'The Island', you don't necessarily need an HD audio format to produce the necessary level of clarity and power for the sound to be impressive.

This disc includes an insightful director's commentary, several featurettes/interviews (the words from which often are included in the featurettes so there is some repetition), deleted scenes and a trailer - all in all a Blu-ray worth getting and watching.

Ok, if you want a review about the film, there are other places to get that, what I'm going to give you is an indepth to the blu-ray specifics that set it above the DVD version.

Picture Quality:
Blu ray is high definition, and this particular movie is in the full 1080p flavour. What I will say is the transfer is definitely not the best quality, and not really close to the top tier titles. Sure, there are more fine details in clothing, and faces, but the entire film is plagued by an almost film-like grain that ruins fine details and adds a very fine 'snowy' layer to the image. Don't let this put you down though, because looking at it side by side with the DVD version it is clearly sharper than the standard DVD. Colour saturation and tonal rendition are good, there are no flaws here and the overall tonality scores top marks, it is never too dark or too light.

Sound:
Great sound on the blu ray, very high quality and very clear. I won't go into the specifics, this film won't push the limits of a top level sound system, but it will certainly impress with the deep bass in the explosions and superb gunfire audio.

Extras:
Firstly, the extras are NOT in HD, and are all in 480 resolution and there are no blu ray exclusives, so really, the DVD edition that has the extras is exactly the same.

Conclusion:
This is certainly a great film; satirical, funny, TRUE, and it has a great moral storyline that occasionally questions ethics and what is right and wrong. The blu ray release is something I have been waiting for for a long time, and honestly I can't help but feel a little let down. Firstly, it should be known that this film isn't to be watched for the visuals, actually it is the story more than anything that pushes this film forward, and the leap to blu ray has not improved any area that needed to be improved. The extras are the same as the DVD version, and the audio is pretty much the same. My final words on this great film, if you're a blu ray collector and want a great film to add to your showcase, not in terms of image quality but in story, then buy this. If you don't mind so much on the format, the 2 disc DVD edition will do just fine, at almost a third of the price.

Hope this helps

I had seen this films a number of times before I decided to buy in on Blu-Ray. For those who havnt watched it and are wondering of they should, it's definately worth the time and the money. One of the great things about it is that unlike many films where the storylines can become utterly rediculous at times, this actually is beleiveable and you can actually understand how this sort of thing happened in the real world! Five stars for Cage, 5 Stars for plot.